


All The Hells Within You

by Mohini



Category: Captain America (Movies), The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: Canon Divergence - Post-Captain America: The Winter Soldier, Hurt/Comfort, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-22
Updated: 2018-09-22
Packaged: 2019-07-15 13:00:50
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,839
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16063682
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mohini/pseuds/Mohini
Summary: “I know you,” the man says, eyes fixed upon Natasha.





	All The Hells Within You

**Author's Note:**

> All the gods, all the heavens, all the hells, are within you.”  
> – Joseph Campbell

“Who let the murderbot in?” Tony asks in a tone that would be more appropriate for commenting on a random homeless person in the lobby than a near mythical assassin standing a few feet inside the entry to the unofficial group space in the tower.

“Bucky?” Steve asks, staring.

“I know you,” the man says, eyes fixed upon Natasha.

“You shot me,” she replies with almost no inflection. Steve is forcibly reminded of what she actually is. Natasha is beautiful and at home in nearly any situation. Sometimes he manages to forget that those situations were largely as an assassin until the very recent past.

“Through you,” is the biting reply. No one knows if they should laugh or reach for weapons at this juncture.

“You patched me up before you left,” Natasha tells him,

Eyes still smudged with blacking soften and there is a hint of a smile as he answers. “You were not the target.”

“Also, I’m your favorite,” Natasha says with a smirk.

“Also, you’re my favorite,” he repeats before stepping forward and wrapping her up in arms that could crush her but instead lift her from the floor in an embrace that seems wrong to witness.  When they separate, there is a deluge of whispered Russian before Natasha turns to Steve.

“You. We need to talk.”

Beside her, the suddenly very tired looking Winter Soldier stares at Steve with a look that is simultaneously hopeful and anxious.

Steve nods. When Natasha leaves the space with Bucky’s hand in hers, Steve follows at what he distantly notes is a near perfect patrol spacing, bypassing the elevators in favor of the stairway until they enter Steve’s private quarters.

He had expected to be led to Natasha’s rooms, but once the tactical portion of his brain fires up it won’t stop spinning. His space is neutral and easy to clear of hazards. The same part of him that recognized their spacing sees that the room, though tasteful, lacks anything of personal effects. It’s the first time he considers that this might be unusual.  Natasha points him to the couch, where she sits in the middle with Bucky at her other side. He is beginning to look as though he’s on the edge of unconsciousness, eyes blinking slowly and a fine tremor at his jaw.

Natasha says something Steve doesn’t catch, and Bucky nods.

“Sputnik,” she snarls. Just one single word, clear, firm, and it would be comical if it didn’t mean that Bucky goes utterly limp within seconds.

Steve’s ready to deck her, but he clenches his fist and hisses out a breath instead. Natasha turns to face him.

“It’s a drop command. He’s exhausted, but no one’s given him a sleep order. So he can’t rest. That will keep him down an hour or so. Go ahead. I know you want to ask.”

“How does he know you?”

“He trained me,” she replies.

“Nat? How old _are_ you?”

“Younger than you.”

“How _much_ younger than me?”

“Only a little,” she says with a sad sort of smile. “Only just a little.”

“Nat, please?” Steve presses. He doesn’t know why, but he needs to know.

 “I was born in 1928.”

“1928.” Steve repeats. “That makes you…”

Nat cuts him off with a single raised finger.

“Don’t you dare, Steve Rogers. Don’t you dare. Look, we don’t have a lot of time, and he’s really rough. When he comes around, he’s going to come up swinging. I can take him, but you’re going to have to be prepared to let me do it. No chivalry, got it? He needs you and I can’t have you fighting him right now.”

Steve nods. He knows better than to try to step in for her. The lesson has been pounded home a few times. Usually by an angry Natasha.

“Let you take him,” Steve repeats. “What are we doing, Nat?”

“We’re letting him come home,” she replies. “He doesn’t know why he knows you. But he knows you’re home.”

Steve mulls that over as Natasha moves around the apartment She shoves  the rest of the furniture to the edges of the room,  calls up some kind of classical music on the sound system, and commands JARVIS to black out all surveillance on the floor. A call to Tony brings a black bag filled with things Steve resolutely decides not to ask about. Someone from medical leaves a bunch of stuff in the guest room closet, and when Steve raises his eyebrows in question Natasha reminds him that his own bruises are still fading from the helicarrier debacle and he’s had actual medical attention.

Some habits never fade, and the tactical master that Steve tries to pretend he isn’t knows exactly when an hour is nearing the end of its time. True to Nat’s assertion, Bucky’s still body and smooth breaths are beginning to edge into restlessness. He’s making a long, low sound that reminds Steve uncomfortably of a wounded animal. When his hands begin to clench and open, Nat motions for Steve to back out of reach and just inside the limits of peripheral vision.

She stands a few feet from Bucky, her voice a steady, almost hypnotic stream of words. He thinks she’s speaking Russian, but it could be any of the Slavic languages. The low sounds coming from Bucky abruptly end, and he’s on his feet before his eyes open.

Natasha snaps something at him, and he swings hard. She blocks the hand and launches herself onto his shoulders. She wraps her torso over his head, a maneuver that causes Bucky to growl something Steve can’t quite catch. 

“Nyet,” Tasha snaps when Bucky tries to throw her off. She somehow swings around to the front of him, clapping him hard on the side of the head. “Nyet, Yasha. Nyet.”

Bucky goes rigid. Then he sinks to his knees on the middle of the floor, face crumpling and going from trying to wrench Nat away from him to crushing her to his chest. Steve doesn’t fully see how the transfer happens, but Natasha is soon the one holding Bucky, and she motions for him to come.

“I have him for you my friend,” she tells Bucky, who looks around with eyes still half aware and half not at all home.  When neither of them follow whatever unspoken command she had for them, she pulls Steve close and then he’s the one holding Bucky.

“Stevie, Stevie, Stevie,” Buck  repeats over and over, hands gripping Steve’s biceps hard enough to bruise deep.

“Yeah Buck,” Steve tells him. “You’re home now.”

“Home,” Buck parrots before releasing his grip on Steve and rocking back onto his heels in a crouch.

“Yasha,” Nat calls to him, and he looks at her with an expression caught between sadness and sheer terror.

“He’s fine, Yasha,” she tells him, and it’s then that Steve realizes that Bucky isn’t examining him for threat but rather for any potential injuries.

He holds out one hand, beckoning Buck to come back. He’s careful to telescope his movements, pulling his shirt over his head to allow for easier examination. Hands that long ago lost the calluses from the docks to be replaced with the disparate sensations of cool metal and warm flesh travel over him in meticulous care.  Steve complies as Buck tests the rotation of his shoulders, the movement of his elbows and hands. He traces two fingers down Steve’s spine, looking for what Steve cannot begin to guess. Nat’s expression leads him to believe that this is not unexpected to her.

When Buck leans back again, it’s with a more relaxed expression, though his eyes still dart around the room as if unable to stop searching for threats.

“Are you hungry?” Steve asks him, certain that if he has been unable to rest in the absence of direct orders, food has probably been low on the list of priorities as well.

Bucky nods, and Steve takes him by the hand and leads him to the kitchen table. He grabs a nutrition drink from the fridge. Making sure that Buck can see him doing it, he opens the seal and hands it over. He’s reminded uncomfortably of starving men in the camps during the war when Buck takes it and drains the contents in moments.

“Hey, hey, slow down,” Steve tells him. “I’ve got plenty, okay? You can have as much as you want but I don’t want you getting sick on me.”

Another nod. Bucky’s swallowing hard, a hand suddenly hovering near his lips to stifle a small belch. Steve reaches over to pull him to his feet and guide him to the couch. Nat disappears down the hall and returns with the bathroom waste bin. Steve knows it would make more sense to just take Bucky to the toilet, but there’s a part of him vividly aware that a room full of fixed objects with hard edges has too much potential to be very bad, very fast.

Still silent as the grave, Buck rests his head against Steve’s shoulder when he offers an arm around him, shaking slightly and breathing impossibly slowly. They stay there for nearly half an hour, no words, no movement, just breathing together as Steve’s mind spins with worries about how in the world he’s going to take care of Buck when he still doesn’t know how to exist in this world himself.

“I think it’s settling okay, Stevie,” Buck tells him eventually. He’s still leaning heavily against Steve, and he doesn’t lift his head when he speaks.

“D’ya want to go get some sleep?” Steve asks him.

“Yeah, tired,” Buck replies.

“Can you sleep?” Steve asks, when Natasha’s words about a sleep command float back across his memory.

“Natka knows the words,” Bucky replies simply. Steve opts not to press for further information. He will later, when he’s ready, perhaps.

 Steve half leads, half drags him to the bedroom. Natasha follows them, pulling the covers back and telling the pair of them to call her if they need a hand when they wake up. She leans down and whispers something in what Steve’s going to assume is Russian.

He expects that the words will drop Bucky like a rag doll, but this time he just nods at Tasha and pats the mattress beside him, looking pointedly at Steve.

 Steve settles onto the too soft mattress, the one he hasn’t slept a proper night on since he came out of the ice. His head sinks into a pillow that is perpetually too deep. 

“C’mere Stevie,” Buck grumbles, tugging him towards the other side of the bed.

Steve goes where he’s told, head pillowed now against Bucky’s shoulder. It’s been 70 years since he’s slept in this space. Buck maneuvers the pair of them until Steve is the little spoon, just as he was before the serum and the end of everything making sense. He’s asleep within moments, resting soundly for the first time since the plane sank into the water with Bucky’s name on his lips.

 

 

 

 


End file.
